Earlier this month, I attended the Association of Writers and Writing Programs annual conference in Seattle. The sheer volume and diversity of program offerings at AWP can be overwhelming and after my newbie experience last year, trying to attend back-to-back panels from 9-5 three days in a row, I opted for a more targeted approach this year. Many of the panels I chose featured writers I admire, some of whom I’m lucky enough to know and work with here in Denver through Lighthouse and the Mile-High MFA program at Regis University. Several appeared on a panel entitled “Writing the Real West: Diverse, Urban and Contemporary,” which began with moderator Jenny Shank’s thought-provoking question, “Why are so many Western novels still set in rural settings even when 89% of Western people live in urban settings?”
First, I had no idea that many of us Western folks reside in cities and towns. Second, yeah, then why are so many novels still framed by remote mountainous settings, isolated ranches, or desert wastelands? Shank, author of the Colorado Book Award-winning short story collection Mixed Company, proposed it might have something to do with the New York publishing industry’s idea that the romanticized “wild, wild West” sells better than a novel set in, say, urban Denver, because shouldn’t that kind of story just be set in New York? (My words, not hers.) This immediately raised another, deeper question: “Who gets to conceptualize reality?”
Of course, in most instances, the answer is whoever holds the power (i.e., the money). In the above scenario, that would be the big publishing houses in New York. From a fictional perspective, it might be wealthy ranchers and farmers. Even the down-and-out cowboys of old were depictions of masculine (usually white) privilege and power. Now I’m not saying those tropes have no place in contemporary fiction (no one on the panel said that either, to be clear). The real issue is how to incorporate stories and voices that were traditionally left out in an authentic, meaningful way. In the aftermath of controversies like the one surrounding American Dirt, many of us are still struggling with how exactly to do that. In my own novel-in-progress, I’m writing about a gold mining town solely from the perspectives of neuro-divergent women who were excluded from decision and wealth-making. I’m also incorporating characters of lived experience outside my own as respectfully and well-researched as possible. My beta readers and critique partners will and do include people of diverse backgrounds. I’m sure I’ll still make mistakes. When in doubt, I return to the advice I’ve been given by countless mentors and instructors over the years, much of which was echoed in the AWP panel:
- There are no perfect (i.e., flat) heroes or villains. Our characters can be both victims and perpetrators of racialized and/or sexist harm.
- We are all experiencing some global-scale trauma, like pandemics and natural disasters, but the repercussions vary significantly across socio-economic lines and that truth can and should be depicted accurately in fiction.
- We don’t want to exorcise the people we grew up with—our friends, co-workers, neighbors, or strangers with different backgrounds—from our work. We can write about them, but not speak for them. (The simplest way to navigate this seems to be limiting point-of-view, especially first person POV, to the characters nearest—not identical—to my own lived experience.)
One closing remark from the panel triggered both anxiety and comfort: “We can’t write fast enough to capture the shifting realities of urban spaces.” If that’s true, there is a relief in knowing there will never be one “right” way to portray the West. I recently had a short story accepted for publication by Twenty Bellows, a Colorado-based literary press focused on “showcasing the work of the next generation of Western artisans.” Yet even their About Us page connects the future with the past in a quote by Louis L’Armour: “Start writing, no matter what. The water does not flow until the faucet is turned on.”
We’ll never get it all right all the time. But that’s not a good enough reason to stop trying.
Thoughtful piece, Rachel!
Love this! Thank you.